Born in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Svjetlana Tepavcevic is currently based in the Washington D.C. area, but maintains a connection with Los Angeles, her longtime home. In the early 1990s, she witnessed the breakup of her country in a bloody war, and lived through the siege of Sarajevo, the longest siege of a European city in modern history. Near the end of the war, she left for the United States, and is now an American citizen.

She holds a B.A. from University of California at Los Angeles and an M.A. from University of Pennsylvania, both in communication studies. She began studying photography in the fall of 2006, never owning a camera prior to that. In the digital era, she chose to learn traditional black-and-white photography first, which connected her to the history of the art form and the artists whose work she has long admired.

Contemplative, interpretive, and uniquely expressed, Tepavcevic’s work explores the world around her through detailed and long-term observation, and centers on how she relates to her subjects. It has been published in magazines throughout the world, including in the Communication Arts’ 2013 Photography Annual. Her prints are in the collection of corporate institutions, private collectors and museums, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston and the High Museum of Arts in Atlanta.